The following contains excerpts from the Introduction and Concluding Remarks of a much larger article reposted from The Foundation.
Joseph George Caldwell, Ph.D.
1) Introduction: This article discusses the end of the industrial age on planet Earth. It describes why it will happen and how it is likely to happen. It identifies a better system of planetary management and ways for increasing the likelihood that it is implemented after the industrial age is over.
The article assesses the current planetary situation (“state of the world”), in which large human numbers and industrial activity are destroying the biosphere and causing a mass species extinction, and it describes what will happen if current trends continue. It examines the relationship of industrial production to energy availability, and concludes that the era of global industrialization will end within a few decades, as global fossil fuel reserves exhaust. When the industrial age comes to an end—either because fossil fuels run out or because of some sort of catastrophe such as global nuclear war—global human population will drop to the same levels as before the industrial age, i.e., to a few hundred million or less.
If the industrial age continues at its present level of activity until fossil fuels exhaust, many of the biosphere’s species will be made extinct, and the risk increases that a catastrophic collapse of the biosphere (or at least a major change in the “balance of nature”) will occur. The article examines a number of different ways in which the industrial age might come to a catastrophic end prior to the exhaustion of global fossil fuel reserves. It concludes that global nuclear war is probably the most likely means, and it describes the likelihood of occurrence and expected consequences of global nuclear war.
The article explores alternatives to the current system of planetary management, under which the biosphere is being radically altered. It describes a human population size and composition (a “minimal-regret” population) that is “environmentally friendly,” i.e., that keeps the impact of human activity low and thereby reduces the likelihood of extinction of mankind and other species from human activities. It identifies and discusses alternative planetary management paradigms that will promote the long-term survival of the biosphere (as we know it) and mankind. It identifies and discusses strategies for reducing the damage that the industrial age will cause to the biosphere prior to its demise, and for increasing the likelihood that a preferred planetary management paradigm is implemented after its end. . . .
2) The State of the World 3) Current Trends, and What Will Happen if They Continue 4) What Can Halt Mankind’s Destruction of the Biosphere? 5) The Effects of Global Nuclear War 6) The Likelihood of Global Nuclear War 7) Planning for the Post-Industrial Era 8) Optimal Human Population Size and Composition 9) Planetary Management Alternatives
10) Concluding Discussion: This article has briefly summarized the human population problem, the concomitant environmental problem, and prospects for the future. A detailed analysis and proposal for change are presented in Can America Survive? (Reference 1) and other articles at The Foundation internet web site and its mirror. The Foundation web sites present general concepts. These sites are intended to increase the likelihood that the survivors of the catastrophe that will end the industrial age will attempt to set up a long-term-survivable system of planetary management, such as synarchic government of a minimal-regret population. The Foundation web sites do not present detailed plans for implementing this form of planetary management. They are intended to stimulate awareness and discussion. Following a planetary catastrophe, it is impossible to say who will survive. The task of implementing a long-term-sustainable population will require dynamic and inspired leadership in a world quite different from that of today. The important thing is to get the message across that it was global industrialization and a multiplicity of independent nations that destroyed the planet, and that what is required for long-term survival in a biologically diverse biosphere is a single planetary government and a very small human population.
The suggestions at the Foundation web sites are oriented toward dissemination of information. Foundation is taking advantage of the Internet to distribute its message to the world. In addition, it is calling for the establishment of departments of planetary management at universities around the world, to stimulate discussion of its planetary management concepts. The goal of the Foundation web sites is to increase awareness of the nature of the problem, and of a feasible solution. It is intended to promote awareness, discussion, and preparation. If you have suggestions about what to do to enhance the chance of survival of mankind and the biosphere, please send them to these web sites.
Most people, when I tell them of my view of what is happening to planet Earth, deny that this is really happening, tell me that I must surely be mistaken, and ask me how I can be so pessimistic. I tell them that I am not at all pessimistic, and that I am thrilled to live in such exciting times. I firmly believe that massive change is just around the corner, but that it will lead to a better world. We are leaving the Piscean Age of exploration and discovery behind us, and entering the Aquarian Age of wisdom. The king is dead; long live the king! This is the dawning of a New Age, a Golden Age. It is a great time to be alive!
René Thom, the “father” of catastrophe theory (expounded in his book, Structural Stability and Morphogenesis), defined a catastrophe as the loss of stability in a dynamic system. Catastrophes are inevitable, but their damage can be lessened if they can be predicted. Without an understanding of what is happening to the planet, and an appreciation for what is possible, the Earth’s biosphere will be severely damaged and many species made extinct, including man. With an understanding of what is going on, and an awareness of what approaches can mitigate the damage being caused by the industrial age, the damage can be controlled, and mankind can continue to inhabit a Garden-of-Eden biosphere for millions of years to come. The “catastrophe” that will destroy industrial civilization and decimate human population is inevitable (since petroleum will soon be gone, and also for the other reasons discussed above). But it is not inevitable that mankind and other large animals become extinct, or that our descendents inherit a destroyed world. By analyzing the problem, synthesizing alternatives, choosing a good solution, and working to implement it, we can surely build a better world for tomorrow.
The tendency for dynamic systems to fail catastrophically has been observed many times, not only in natural systems, but also in mathematical representations of them (i.e., in “system models”). Catastrophes may be caused by forces that are essentially “exogenous” in nature (e.g., an asteroid, volcano, invasion of one tribe or nation or civilization by another), or they may be caused by factors that are essentially “endogenous” (e.g., overpopulation). Examples of the former include the Chicxulub-Crater asteroid that reputedly caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, and the destruction of Carthage by the Romans. Examples of the latter include the sudden disappearance of Assyria, political revolutions (America, France, Russia), algal blooms (e.g., Lester Brown’s The Twenty-Ninth Day), the Easter Island human population explosion and collapse, and the St. Matthew Island reindeer population explosion and collapse. And, of course, today’s global population explosion and imminent collapse. In large natural (population) systems, an equilibrium may last for a very long time, but sudden and dramatic changes invariably occur from time to time. Change always happens, and sometimes it is dramatic.
In the 1950s, MIT professor Jay W. Forrester developed a methodology, called system dynamics, for describing, modeling and simulating dynamic systems. (The methodology was implemented in a computer simulation language called DYNAMO (predecessor to STELLA and other system simulation languages), and had various names, such as Industrial Dynamics and World Dynamics.) This methodology was the basis for the book, The Limits to Growth, published in 1972 and its sequel, Beyond the Limits, published in 1992. The most likely end of a world simulation model is a sudden and uncontrollable decline in population, per-capita food output, energy use, and industrial capacity (see the SynEarth CommUnity of Minds web site for a synopsis of the Limits to Growth and Beyond the Limits). What often happens in a finite-resource system is that a limit is reached on a critical resource and the system has no suitable substitute that would enable it to continue to operate as in the past. After an extended period, important variables may be operating at extreme levels that are quite unsustainable, and the system becomes unstable if even small changes occur, or a key resource exhausts. The interesting thing to note is that dynamic systems often evolve, as noted by Thom, toward a catastrophic failure, even though no external factor is involved! Dynamic systems, it appears, tend to “crash and burn,” whether in nature or in the laboratory. The incredible thing is that, although this type of behavior is a very salient characteristic of dynamic systems, most people, including world political leaders and environmental scientists, act as if it will be possible to somehow avoid a catastrophic end. History has almost always proved otherwise.
While it is indeed possible to manage human population at a long-term sustainable level, the sustainable level of human population is but a small fraction of today’s high levels. The fact is that human population has grossly exceeded the carrying capacity of the planet. It has grown to massive size because of the one-time tapping of fossil fuel. The recurrent budget of solar energy can support at most a few hundred million people. Because petroleum will soon be gone, and because human numbers are so high, it is now totally impossible for human population to shrink back to sustainable levels in an orderly fashion, before the end of the petroleum era. A precipitous collapse of human population is now inevitable. This is quite apart from the possibility of an ecological disaster brought on by mankind’s mass extermination of the species comprising its ecological home, or by global warming. We have “overshot” the carrying capacity of the planet, and the population will collapse as soon as petroleum exhausts (or sooner). (See Prof. William R. Catton, Jr.’s article on overshooting carrying capacity.)
Mankind began treading on dangerous ground over ten thousand years ago, when it evolved beyond the hunter-gatherer lifestyle, when it as a species acquired the “knowledge of good and evil” and left the Garden-of-Eden paradise in which it evolved. Agriculture was the first major step along the road to economic development of the planet. The second major step was the development of modern technology and the tapping of fossil fuels, a few centuries ago. At that time, human population began to grow and grow and grow. Human population began to overshoot the planet’s carrying capacity (solar-energy capacity) several hundred years ago. It now exists at incredibly and unsustainably high levels, supported by the one-time windfall of fossil fuels. As fossil fuels exhaust, billions will perish. There is no avoiding this demise, no matter how low or how fast the birth rate falls in the world’s nations. The “demographic transition” is too late and too exceptional. We are today witnessing the last few moments of the fabulous overshoot, and we will soon experience the spectacular collapse. The authors of The Limits to Growth and Beyond the Limits suggest that it may be possible to avoid the collapse, and transit peacefully to a long-term-sustainable equilibrium. This is no longer possible. What is possible is to set up a different kind of world, a long-term-sustainable world, after the collapse.
The end of the world—the end of the industrial age—is coming soon, and, according to Thom’s catastrophe theory (and Forrester’s system dynamics and Catton’s overshoot-and-collapse theory), it will come fast and hard. The United Nations, the World Bank, and all the world’s leaders are calling for ever more industrial production and a higher standard of living for everyone, even as the biosphere shudders from mankind’s savage onslaught and petroleum reserves continue their decline to exhaustion with ever increasing speed. This final orgy of industrial production and consumption will hasten and magnify and ensure the collapse.
It should be recognized that the significant catastrophe that is happening now is not the imminent collapse of human population from many billion to a few hundred million or less. The significant catastrophe that is happening now is the sudden mass species extinction that is taking place. A big change in the human population is of no long-term significance, as long as the biosphere remains intact, i.e., the balance of nature remains essentially the same as that in which the human species evolved. Under these conditions, future generations of mankind can continue to live meaningful lives, for millions of years, in the rich environment in which it evolved. As long as the biosphere is essentially intact, mankind as a species continues to thrive, and all options remain open. But the mass species extinction can render mankind extinct, or, what is infinitely worse, make his planet-home a much less interesting and desirable place to live, for millions of future generations. As long as the biosphere is preserved intact, mankind may continue to experience and enjoy life on a marvelous planet for a very long time. If the biosphere is substantially damaged, some doors, some varieties of experience, some alternative futures, will have been closed forever.
Mankind has, it seems, an infinite capacity for denial. This was discussed at some length in my recent article, Hubris. The evidence is overwhelming that we are in the “overshoot” phase of the industrial life cycle, yet most people and most organizations refuse even to discuss this matter, let alone acknowledge it. There is indeed none so blind as he who will not see. The US and other nations are scrambling to discover and control more oil, even though all oil will be gone in a few decades. The only difference that this activity will make in the long run is to ensure that things will be worse, because precious time, effort and resources will have been taken away from solving the real problem confronting mankind. People and organizations and nations are busying themselves with things that make no difference—economic efficiency, recycling of resources, fuel-efficient cars, hydrogen fuel cells, human rights, gender equality, racial inequality, poverty reduction, higher standards of living, lower infant mortality, longer life spans, controlling HIV/AIDS—when none of these things will make any difference at all in stopping the mass species extinction or reducing the risk of biospheric death from industrial activity, and in preserving our options for the future. None of the significant national or international or private programs on Earth today will help solve this problem. They are in fact tackling the wrong problem. The human population has overshot the planet’s carrying capacity and will soon collapse (either because fossil fuels will soon be gone or because of a global system failure of some sort), and the efforts to try to avoid this collapse are as futile as trying to sweep back the tide. Time and effort spent on trying to solve this problem are worse than wasted, since they take attention and resources away from the real problem. Attention should focus on how to stop the mass species extinction, not on how to continue the system that is causing it. Attention should focus on identifying what systems of planetary management will ensure long-term sustainability of humankind in a preserved biosphere, and on taking steps to ensure the implementation of one such system after the collapse of the current one.
Over the past few decades, the problem facing mankind and the biosphere has undergone an incredible transmogrification. International organizations such as the United Nations and the World Bank have focused world attention on increasing global industrial production and per capita industrial production, and on improving standards of living for more and more people, even though this destroys more and more species every year. They have sold the message that the problem will be solved by more industrial production, when in fact this is the source of the problem. They have successfully transformed global industrialization from being the problem into being the solution! Many people now believe that mankind’s salvation rests in increasing the standard of living for everyone, no matter how large the human population, and that the mass species extinction is nothing more than an unfortunate and not-very-important side-effect. All of the world’s economic and political resources are now focused on increasing the level of global industrialization and industrial production. The message is very seductive: liberal democracy and peace and economic development and globalization and privatization and deregulation and decentralization will make everyone better off (see Thomas L. Friedman’s The Lexus and the Olive Tree for details). Alas, none of this will save mankind from the impending die-off. In fact, it simply increases the magnitude of the overshoot, assuring a sooner and harder collapse. And it ensures more mass species extinction. What a pity that those incredible resources could not have been applied to the problem of determining a long-term-sustainable system of planetary management.
Students and masters of catastrophe theory and related subjects (e.g., system dynamics) evidently agree that if the nature of an impending catastrophe can be better understood, it may be possible to reduce the damage from it. This viewpoint is the subject not only of scientific studies (e.g., the Limits to Growth), but of science fiction as well (e.g., Isaac Asimov’s Foundation). What is amazing, however, is that today’s human society views the present planetary catastrophe (to the limited extent that it considers it at all) only in terms of its impact on itself—on the current generation of human beings. From the viewpoint of future generations, Nero is fiddling as Rome burns. US President George Bush declared, “The US lifestyle is not negotiable!” From this viewpoint, what happens to the quality of life for all future generations of man is not relevant. The nations of the world are working feverishly to find new energy sources that might maintain humanity’s bloated numbers for a little while longer, even though this means more damage to the biosphere and a reduced quality of life for all future generations. If the problem is to be solved, it is essential that people recognize that the significant catastrophe of our age is the mass species extinction, not the impending die-off of mankind’s absurdly high and planet-destroying numbers. The coming die-off is not the problem. It is inevitable. The problem is how to transit, as the die-off transpires, to a human population and planetary management system that is sustainable in the long term, both for mankind and the biosphere. It is also how to minimize the further damage that will occur to the biosphere prior to and during the transition. This bears repeating: In the catastrophe that is taking place, the significant damage is mass species extinction, not a decrease in human population size. If it is accepted that the objective is to increase the likelihood of survival of mankind and a diverse biosphere, then the objective is not to avoid a human die-off, which will happen in any event, and which is in fact the root cause of the mass species extinction.
In An Historian’s Approach to Religion, Arnold Toynbee discusses the sin of hubris: “Self-centeredness is thus a necessity of Life, but this necessity is also a sin. Self-centered is an intellectual error, because no living creature is in truth the center of the Universe; and it is also a moral error, because no living creature has a right to act as if it were the center of the Universe. It has no right to treat its fellow-creatures, the Universe, and God or Reality as if they existed simply in order to minister to one self-centered living creature’s demand. To hold this mistaken belief and to act on it is the sin of hybris (as it is called in the language of Hellenic philosophy); and this hybris is the inordinate, criminal, and suicidal pride which brings Lucifer to his fall (as the tragedy of Life is presented in the Christian myth.)
“Since self-centeredness is thus both a necessity of life and at the same time a sin that entails a nemesis, every living creature finds itself in a life-long quandary. A living creature can keep itself alive only in so far, and for so long, as it can contrive to steer clear both of suicide through self-assertion and of euthanasia through self-renunciation. The middle path is as narrow as a razor’s edge, and the traveler has to keep his balance under the perpetual high tension of two pulls towards two abysses between which he has to pick his way.” Today’s generation of human beings is acting as if it is the only generation of human beings—and indeed the only species—that matters. And for that sin it will pay dearly. All billions of it will perish. As it is written, “Those who destroy the Earth shall be destroyed.”
The world after the industrial age will be very different from the world of today. For most people on Earth (if mankind escapes extinction), it will be similar to the world of the past millions of years—a primitive, natural environment (although perhaps less bountiful and beautiful than before). Although most people will not survive the collapse of the industrial age, it will belong, in concept and structure, to those who prepare for the great change that is about to happen—to the planetary “change managers.” Since it is difficult to predict who the survivors of the collapse of the industrial age will be and where they will be located, it is necessary for any group committed to assuming control of the planet after the collapse of the industrial age to have advocates—informed, prepared, and committed advocates—distributed everywhere around the world, so that they are sure to be included among the survivors. And achieving that state is the purpose of The Omega Project, and of this article: to sensitize the world about what is happening and is about to happen, to inform it of a better system of planetary management, and to help ensure that such a system will be established after the end of the present system.
Will the industrial age end with a destroyed biosphere and the extinction of mankind and other large species? Or will further damage to the biosphere be averted, and a synarchic government of a minimal-regret population be established to ensure the long-term survival of mankind and the biosphere as we know it? I believe that it will, but bringing it about will take much hard work and decisive action. This goal will not be accomplished by the weak of heart or the weak of mind or the weak of body. As I noted in Can America Survive?, the land belongs to those who are willing (and able) to kill for it. This has always been the way of the world, throughout the ages—not just in prehistoric times but in historic, “civilized” times as well (e.g., the Egyptians, the Romans, the British and Americans in North America, the whites of yesterday in Rhodesia, the blacks of today in Zimbabwe). The industrial age will end soon, and the planet will belong to those who, as always, are willing and able to kill for it.
The era in which large nations possess parts of the planet, destroying nature for commercial profit, is almost over. In the New Age, a single group—a planetary management organization—will be in charge of the entire planet, and its goal will be to ensure that natural planetary processes operate largely unhindered by mankind. Note that although the present system of having many independent nations will give way to a single world government, local possession of the land by small groups, such as clans or tribes, will return. The planet will be controlled by a single high-technology organization, whose essential function is simply to prevent the return of global industrialization (and, it follows, massive human population). Except for its role of disallowing the resurgence of global industrial activity, however, it will leave the globally distributed hunter-gatherer population rather on its own (at least initially). Local tribes will be free to live in a natural setting, as they did for millions of years. It is industrial nationalism—a world of many independent and industrialized and competing states—that is not a viable system of planetary management. Local nonindustrialized tribes will regain the freedom they once had. The stranglehold that nationalism (or imperialism) had on local ethnic groups will be broken, since the military and political power that flowed from industrialization (including industrial agriculture), will no longer exist, except as embodied in the single, small high-technology planetary management organization. (It is noted that primitive human groups do not really “possess” or “own” the land, any more than a pride of lions possesses a part of the African savanna. They simply “occupy” it along with many other species, and function in harmonious balance with each other as an integral part of the biosphere.)
A single-nation government of a small human population will stop the mass species extinction, and will afford humanity an opportunity to “figure things out.” I am not so much of utopian, however, as to believe that this arrangement, or any other, will last forever, or even for a very long time. Mankind thrives not only on challenge but also on conflict. A single-nation planetary management organization will face the challenge of preventing a second destruction of the planet by economic philosophy and industrial development, but it will also face the challenge of new minds and new thinking and new people who want to do new things their own way. All that is certain is that the present out-of-control, anarchic system of planetary management—two hundred independent nations, all striving to produce and consume and to grow—is rapidly destroying the planet and will not last much longer. The present world order will soon disappear, and a new world order will take its place. While we cannot stop the collapse of the current system, we can certainly influence what replaces it, and determine the quality and diversity of life on the planet for millennia to come. That is an achievable goal; preventing the collapse of the industrial world and today’s large human population is not.
You may ask, “If the industrial world collapses, and, as you say, most people will die, then why should I prepare?” It is true that most of us will die as the industrial world ends and human population declines to levels that can be supported by current solar energy. But, barring a total collapse of the biosphere, there will still be human population remnants alive in various parts of the world. Some of them will be related to you—either your family, or your tribe, or your nation, or your race. If one group sets up a synarchic government of the planet and establishes a minimal-regret population, odds are that you or your tribe or nation will not be a part of the governing group, since that group will be a single, small, locally compact organization. But your descendents will surely number among the remnant groups that are distributed over the Earth. And, if a synarchic government / minimal-regret population is established, they will continue to survive. In either case, the long-term survival of people related to you—descendents of your family / tribe / race—is assured, if a synarchic government / minimal-regret population is established. Under a continuation of the present planetary management system (large human population, global industrialization, many independent nations) all people—including your descendents—will almost surely perish, and the Garden-of-Eden biosphere in which we evolved will be forever diminished. Will your descendents survive, and inhabit a wonderful continent, bountiful in natural splendor, on a marvelous planet? Or will your succeeding generations perish; or be doomed to millions of years on a ruined planet, and curse your name and time? The choice is yours. The choice is for Earth’s present generation. May you choose well.